


Truth of the Matter

by MacyAudenStar



Category: Haven - Fandom
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-20
Updated: 2014-12-20
Packaged: 2018-03-02 10:16:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2808782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MacyAudenStar/pseuds/MacyAudenStar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Secrets get aired when a truth trouble hits Haven.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Truth of the Matter

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Yukito](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yukito/gifts).



> Happy Yuletide! I hope you enjoy this!

Audrey fidgeted with her cup of coffee as she and Nathan drove to the station. She and Duke had only been back from Colorado for a week before he and Nathan got sent back in time. She and Nathan hadn’t even really had a chance to talk, to share with each other what they learned. Her about the Colorado Kid, him about Sarah. She wondered if she should tell him about the kiss.

Guilt gnawed at the back of her mind, she knew he’d be hurt. Even though he was with Jordan. The relationship between Duke and Nathan was just complicated. Maybe not as complicated as they enjoyed making it out to be, but complicated nonetheless. As for the relationship between her and Nathan…Well, she confessed her love to a dead version of him, and they hadn’t exactly talked about that either.

“Parker?” She jolted out of her thoughts and looked at Nathan, who had that amused half-smile gracing his face. “You ok over there?”

“Yes. Yeah, sorry,” she nodded quickly, furrowing her brow. “Did you say something?”

“We’re here.” She looked around, they had, indeed, stopped and she hadn’t noticed. “Come on. Maybe today will be normal.”

She smiled at him. “You mean like lost pets and helping schoolchildren crossing the road?” She got out of the car, shutting the door quickly. “That is what you guys do when there are no troubles to worry about, right?”

“Something like that,” he drawled. “You could finally tell me about Colorado.”

“And you could finally tell me about Sarah.” She thought she saw something flash in his eyes, but when she studied him closer, it was gone. “Maybe one day.”

“One day,” he echoed in a agreement. They walked in to the station, surprised to find a handful of people surrounding Stan, all talking over one another. “Not today though,” he murmured. He looked over at her and she nodded, both of them walking over to see what they could do to help. “Stan, what’s going on over here?”

Stan sighed in relief and backed away from the group of people so they could all talk quietly. “Thank goodness you two are here. I think this might be a Haven thing.”

“Why do you say that?” Audrey took a sip of her coffee, looking at the people who seemed to calm down a bit in Nathan’s presence.

“They’ve all come in sometime in the last ten minutes, wanting to confess,” Stan said.

“Confess to what?” Audrey asked.

“Crimes they’ve committed over the years,” Stan said quietly. Audrey’s eyes widened. “But they’re all small crimes. Like, Emily Bledsoe over there? She jaywalked yesterday, and ten years ago, she broke her neighbor’s window on accident and lied about it.” Audrey stifled a grin into her coffee cup as Stan went on, describing how John Williams ran a red light three weeks ago, Patty Newsom steals her neighbor’s newspaper, and so on.

“Vick Triton stole  that map over at Duke’s bar two months ago,” Stan added. “He brought it in, left just a few minutes before you guys got here, I put it in your office, Audrey.”

“Thanks,” she murmured. “I’ll have to give him a call, have him come down here to pick it up.”

Nathan furrowed his brow. “I guess we’ll start taking statements. Maybe see if any of them know the same people. Figure out where they went this morning.”

And hope whoever had this particular trouble decided to turn around and go back home for the day, Audrey thought. She nodded in agreement with Nathan and pulled Patty into her office to take the woman’s statement. The older woman was very contrite when explaining how she steals the Matthews family’s paper every morning, reads it, then puts it right back where she found it.

“I know it’s wrong,” Patty said sadly. “But I just can’t help it. It gives me such a rush to know that they don’t know I’m doing it.” She looked down at the Kleenex in her hand. “Detective, are you going to arrest me? If you do, is there any way I can get out of jail by the time my grandbaby is born?”

“Oh, I don’t think we’re going to need to take it that far, Mrs. Newsom. But you should probably look into getting your own newspaper subscription,” Audrey said, looking down at the list of names on her paper. “Did you go anywhere this morning, before coming here, I mean?”

Patty nodded. “I went to the Lillian’s Flower Shop, the grocery store to pick up a few things, and the bakery, which is mostly to get my husband coffee. But there’s this really handsome gentleman that just started working there and I just love seeing him in the morning,” her voice dropped to a whisper. “Please don’t tell anyone, Detective.” Audrey shook her head in amusement and Patty continued, “And then I got home, saw the paper sitting on my counter and the guilt just gnawed at me until I had to turn myself in.”

Audrey nodded slowly. “Ok. Well, thank you very much, Mrs. Newsom. You’re free to go.” She walked Patty to the office door and shrugged when she saw Nathan’s inquisitive glance.

*             *             *

A few hours later, they’d compared notes and came up with a plan. Everyone who’d come in that morning had stopped at Cups for coffee that morning, so they planned on starting there. But first, they decided they’d take Duke’s sign back to him.

“Audrey, Nathan, to what do I owe this pleasure?” Duke was sitting in the restaurant, looking over the night’s menu while drinking coffee out of one of Cups’ coffee mugs. Audrey caught Nathan’s eye and looked pointedly at the cup in Duke’s hand.

“We brought you a present,” Audrey said. She looked over at Nathan, who was holding the framed map behind his back.

Duke’s eyes lit up in recognition. “Who had it?” He asked as he took it out of Nathan’s hands.

“Vick Triton,” Nathan admitted.

“He turned himself in this morning,” Audrey added. “New trouble in town.”

Duke groaned. “We can’t get one day can we? What is it this time?”

“Well,” Audrey said slowly. “We’re not entirely sure yet. We had a whole bunch of people admitting their guilt over various ‘crimes’ they’ve committed this morning. So guilt or truth related?” She shrugged. “They all stopped at Cups for coffee this morning. So we’re going to start there.”

“Cups. For coffee.” Duke repeated. Audrey smiled slowly as she saw the wheels turning. “I might have stopped there this morning.”

“You don’t say,” Nathan drawled, crossing his arms over his chest.

Duke sighed and ran his hands through his hair. “You guys gotta solve this thing. I can’t start spilling my guts to the cops.” Audrey raised her eyebrows. “We’d be here all day. I’m already biting back the urge to tell you guys that I parked illegally to get this coffee.” He looked down at the floor and mumbled some curse word that Audrey couldn’t quite catch.

Nathan smiled slowly. “Really.” He looked like he wanted to say more, but stopped when he got a call from Laverne. “Parker, we gotta gunman at 516 Slate St.”

Audrey’s eyes widened in surprise. “Good seeing you, Duke.”

Nathan nodded and they turned to leave but Duke’s voice stopped them. “You guys want some help with this one?”

Audrey looked at Nathan, who shrugged, and Duke followed them out to the car. “You sure you don’t want to stay here, board yourself up so you can keep all you various crimes to yourself?” Audrey teased as they got into Nathan’s truck.

“As much as that sounds like a good idea, I don’t want to see either of you get hurt. I care about you both too much,” he sighed in exasperation. “I really want to catch this guy quick, ok?”

Audrey snorted, not bothering to hide her amusement. “Wait,” she turned in her seat to look at Duke. “You mean to tell me all this time, you’ve cared about Nathan?”

“Of course I do,” Duke said, looking hurt. She side-eyed Nathan, pleased to see an amused glint in his eye. “Nathan’s like my brother. I know I’m not always very nice to him, but I love him.” He frowned at Audrey. “I don’t like you very much right now though.”

“I don’t believe that for a second,” she teased.

“Just because I have feelings for you, doesn’t mean I always like you, Audrey,” Duke grumbled. “You have to know how I feel, after Colorado.”

Audrey felt her face heat up and watched as Nathan grabbed hold of Duke’s words. “What happened in Colorado?” Nathan asked, looking over at her with a frown.

“Audrey and I kissed,” Duke said. “She pulled away. Because of you.”

“You kissed?” Nathan asked, hurt lacing his voice.

“Nathan,” Audrey said softly. She reached out to lay her hand on his arm, but pulled back. Neither of them needed the reminder that he could feel her right then.

“And she pulled away because of you,” Duke repeated. “Besides, it’s not like you didn’t follow Sarah around like a puppy dog even though you have a girlfriend. Remember Jordan?”

“Wait, what?” Audrey asked. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to bring Duke along. They pulled up in front of the house and she shook her head. “You know what, it doesn’t matter. We can talk about it later. We need to help these people.”

*             *             *

Hours later, they’d finally solved the case. Thankfully, as Duke continued to let little truths about his “nefarious doings” drop throughout the day, always looking a mixture of contrite and pissed off after. They stopped the gunman, but didn’t stop him from finding out that his wife had an affair with his brother. She was sure that wasn’t the only life-ruining bit of information that someone received that day.

Nathan admitted he loves her too, told her that he was warned to stay out of a relationship with her. But she stopped him from admitting who told him. She didn’t need to know.

All of that, and she was days away from finding a barn and being forced into it. After all the things that happened to the rest of the town as a result of this truth trouble, she wasn’t sure that she could go on allowing these awful things to happen to the people of Haven. Let alone the people she loved in it.

She wrapped her sweater tighter around her body as she stared out at the water from her porch. She heard someone coming up the steps and turned to look, unsurprised to see Nathan with a couple of beers.

“Parker,” he said quietly. She lifted her shoulder in greeting as she reached her hand out for the beer he was offering up. “You ready to have that talk?” She nodded gratefully and gestured for him to sit. As she waited for him to choose his words, she studied him, wishing, more than anything, that she could find some way to fix the troubles once and for all, while staying with him.

 


End file.
